Star Wars:
Dark Legacy

By: Myst Dragon

Chapter 1

In what was once a storage room, two people sparred. One was an old man, in his fifties, wearing tan robes and pants. The other was a young girl dressed in a similar outfit colored in light charcoal gray. The girl tried to strike the old man high with one of the two sword-length sticks she held but he ducked low and tripped her with his staff. The hard landing winding her, she lost her grip on her sticks. The old man leaned down holding a hand out. "Caitlin, you have to learn to be more patient. If these were lightsabers, you'd have lost a leg." He told her with a sigh, his concern showing plainly on his face.

"I hardly see how my dueling skills matter, since I'll probably spend my whole life in hiding. I thought Jedi were supposed to fight Sith, not hide while two of them rule the galaxy!" Her complaint was one the old man was getting used to hearing from her in recent years.

"My time has passed, and yours has yet to come. You have to remember patience. The galaxy is alive with the force as all things and its balance will shift. We must always trust in the Force to know when it is our time to act." He placed a hand on her shoulder and brushed back a bit of her chestnut colored hair, which fell to her shoulders. "The alliance has made great progress, and they even have a Jedi among them now, and…" The old man paused as he sensed a faint disturbance in the Force that tried to keep itself hidden. "I need you to go to the cave and collect the box hidden there."

"But why, Master Van?" She asked confused.

"Just do it!" He snapped at her, shocking the teenaged girl. After a moment she turned around and left without a word. Master Van took a deep breath as he leaned his staff against a wall and opened a small case containing his lightsaber. Its metallic length was roughly twice that of a standard saber. With it in hand, he sat down in the middle of the room and meditated. Soon after, the doors to the room opened and a tall, wiry man with spiked blonde hair entered. He dressed like a member of a swoop bike gang. "So, you've finally found me. How is Raven?" There was a twinge of regret as he asked about the woman he'd met before the Jedi purge, instigated by Palpatine.

"Lord Zerak finally took her place as the Master, and when I bring him the key to finding the library, I'll be his apprentice and eventually do the same to him." The man grinned maliciously self-assured of his destiny.

"Quiyllo, you deluded fool. You were among the fortunate children not to be on Corascant, Why take this path?" The old man asked in an almost pleading manner.

"Being hunted by half the Galaxy has shown us the power of the Dark Side. With the Emperor dead, we no longer need to bide our time. With the knowledge you hid in the library so long ago, we will have more than enough power to take control of the Empire!" Quiyllo clenched his fist to emphasize his last statement.

"The Dark Side is a thing of pain and destruction only. If you willingly submit yourself to such a destiny, then killing you now would be too great a mercy." What started as a plea, became cold as Master Van realized it fell on deaf ears. "You know I will never give you that information. You'd be better off searching on your own, but it should be obvious that there is no clue to the library here."

"Then let's get this over with." Quiyllo pulled his double lightsaber from his belt and ignited both ends with their crimson blades.

"As you wish." The old man followed suit with his own golden bladed, double lightsaber. Quiyllo immediately started with a horizontal slash to the old man's throat, but the old Jedi blocked and struck at the younger man's legs. The younger man jumped to avoid the attack and sent one of his blades down at the old man's head! Master Van sidestepped and the rapid cycle of slashes continued. Quiyllo's attacks gradually became more aggressive as the fight continued. Master Van's body started to complain about the pace, but the aged Jedi eventually found a crucial opening. As he sidestepped another downward slash, he quickly brought his own saber down cutting Quiyllo's in half! Without losing a beat, he followed through by using the Force to shove his opponent against a wall. The hard impact winded the Sith and he dropped the two pieces of his saber. Before he could fully recover, Master Van used the Force to send the two halves down a drain leading down into the cavern below his home. Quiyllo reached out with the Force and sent two crates flying at the old Jedi! Master Van managed to divert one but the other caught his hands, making him drop his lightsaber. The blades vanished as the weapon hit the floor. The blonde man quickly drew the weapon to his hands and reactivated it.

"Can you hear that old man? It sounds like the Force is calling for you." Quiyllo taunted as he charged the old man. Master Van simply stood there, allowing his hands to fall as the blade of his own saber struck him. As it made contact he vanished becoming one with the Force. "Stupid old man." The young Sith began tearing rooms apart searching for the clue that would lead him to the lost library.

Down in the Caverns, Caitlin made her way back with a small metal box. She was a little annoyed by how deep in the caverns the box was left, but understood that it had to be important. She reached a door that blocked off the portion of the cave she was in, but it refused to acknowledge her code. She tried to open it repeatedly before finally giving up, wishing she'd brought a comm. "He should come looking for me eventually. I'll just wait right here." Shortly after she sat down something fell on top of her head. She looked down to see two halves of a double lightsaber, and she became frightened. She examined them, but neither half seemed to function. She started trying to use the Force to open the door, but in her panic her attempts were ineffective. After more than an hour of trying to force the door open, her breathing had become heavy and as she was about to collapse, the door unlocked and opened. She took a deep, determined breath and dashed out of the cave to try to help the old man who'd been like a father to her since she was an infant!

As she ran into the house, she saw items thrown everywhere, but she couldn't sense her master anywhere. As she entered the storage room where she'd last seen her master, she immediately noticed the mess, and the old man's robes piled on the floor. She also saw the stray marks left from the lightsaber battle and she knew what happened to him. "It can't be." She collapsed, struggling with the harsh realization. "He can't be dead." Her tears came, uncontrollably and she was stuck there for hours in her torment.

When she was finally able to drag herself out of the room, she righted a chair and set the box down on the dining table. The teenaged girl was still shaking with grief. She opened the box to find a datapad with a message set for playback. She activated it and a message recorded by Master Van started playing back immediately. "If you are hearing this recording then I am most likely no longer with you and for that I am sorry. This datapad contains instructions to find the key to locating a vast library of both Sith and Jedi knowledge. The council instructed me to hide the library of holocrons, and if I am indeed dead, then you must ensure that no Sith find it. I am entrusting this task to you. I only hope that when you receive this message, you are ready." For the next few hours she carefully studied the datapad. When she was finished she stood up with a deep sigh and walked to the security monitor. She played back the recording of the storage room during the time she was out, and viewed a holographic playback of the fight. When the playback was complete, her lost expression was replaced by a fierce determination, and she marched to the workshop with the wrecked double lightsaber.

The young woman spent the next few days taking apart the saber, salvaging most of the key components, including two red crystals, and with the salvaged components, she fashioned her own pair of twin lightsabers. There was an artistic sense to their contoured design, as a piece of black metal was wrapped around half of their silver Metallic shells. Once she was satisfied with their appearance and ruggedness, she spun and juggled them to test their weight and balance. She grinned with satisfaction and held one out for its final test. She tapped the two power buttons she'd built into it in sequence, causing the energy to ignite into a crimson blade as it passed through the red crystal. She ignited the other lightsaber and gave a contented smile. "These will do nicely for bringing justice to that murderer." For a moment her expression sank and she deactivated the lightsabers. "I shouldn't delude myself. This isn't justice I want, but I can't just let it go."

The next morning, she stepped out of the fresher and dressed in her primarily charcoal colored outfit. Her pants were fitted with just enough room to move around, and she took care as she wrapped her dual layered robe top around her abdomen, securing it with a dark tan belt. She tucked her pants into her dark brown boots, and put bracers that she'd rigged to hold her lightsabers on between the two sleeve layers, in order to hide them under the flared outer sleeve. She filled a bag with a spare outfit and a few small personal items, because for the moment she felt it was better for her to travel light. As she left, she wondered if she would ever return, and for a moment she saw her old master sitting at the dining table drinking his special tea.

Soon after she arrived in the nearby farming settlement of Tanaak, she sold her master's swoop bike for a fair amount of credits. The amount wasn't as much as she thought it was worth, but she wasn't going to argue over the price with so many stormtroopers around the settlement which doubled as a starport. She never felt too comfortable around the men dressed in white armor, and she sometimes wondered if they really were men under those masked helmets. She wasted no time heading to a Cantina that she'd heard most of the least reputable spacers go while their ships are being loaded, unloaded, or going through special repairs.

She walked into the cantina and looked around. The music was soft and mellow, and there were many people in talking over drinks. Some were even playing a few of the popular card games. Given the conditions which she'd grown up in, she'd rarely had the chance to see so many alien races in person, but she didn't have much time to look around before she noticed a commotion in a part of the bar. There was a man wearing a tan jacket, black pants, and a blaster on his right side. He seemed quite upset as he yelled at another man sitting at the table, surrounded by four guards. The man at the table sneered and said something, Caitlin couldn't hear, not that she could understand the other man's yelling. The man in the jacket eventually got frustrated and went to the bar. She decided to trust her feelings, and as she approached the man, she came to appreciate his short black hair. "Excuse me, but what was that about?" She asked.

"Just business with a slime that thinks he's a Hutt. You'd be better off staying out of it." He sighed and glanced at her, and then did a double-take, leaving his eyes on her. "Say, aren't you a little young to be in a dump like this?"

"I need a ship to take me somewhere, but I don't want it being too visible." She told him, trying not to sound too vague without giving too much away.

"Well good look getting offworld without starport visa." He told her flatly, with a hint of bitterness.

"What? Since when?" Her eyes widened as she heard the news.

"Have you been buried under a rock all of your life? The way I hear it; it's been like this way since the Governor decided he wanted to keep more of the locals local. Off-worlders like me are given visas as part of the docking fee." He explained the situation, feeling a little strange, since she seemed like a local. "You really didn't know?"

"No, I've lived outside of the settlement my whole life. Isn't there some way you could sneak me on your ship?" She baited him to see if her guess about his business with the other man was right.

"I can't even get to my ship without a visa, much less cargo." He shook his head as realized what he'd revealed to the young woman.

"If I get your visa back, will you take me to at least two planets?" She grinned as she proposed the bargain.

He grinned, not really taking her seriously. "Sure kid. My name's Jak Carlson, by the way. What's yours?" He held out his hand as he introduced himself.

She took his hand. "Caitlin Tallus." She trusted her feelings which told her to trust him. "When's the soonest we can leave?"

He laughed a little. Jak wasn't quite sure what to make of the young woman. "If you can get us both visas, then I'll go whenever you want."

"Then you'd better finish your drink and pay your tab, 'cause this'll just be a minute." Caitlin smiled confidently and headed off towards the table where the crime boss sat. From everything she'd heard and read, men in his position tended to be willful, but if he'd been drinking enough of what her nose had been picking up, then he should be a bit more open to persuasion. She made special note of how far each of his guards' hands were away from their blasters.

"Can I help you?" He asked the question with an expression on his face that spoke volumes about what he was thinking about doing to her. For a brief moment she was tempted to wipe the expression off, but she pushed the thought aside and mentally reminded herself of the code her master taught her.

She made a barely noticeable gesture with her hand as she reached into his mind through the Force and spoke to him. "You want to give me Captain Carlson's starport visa so he can deliver your cargo."

"I want to give you Captain Carlson's starport visa so he can deliver my cargo." He answered her in an almost trance-like voice. As he reached into his jacket to get the card, Caitlin saw another visa hanging just inside of his jacket. She smiled as he slid Jak's card across the table. She gracefully picked it up and tucked it into her outer robe as she walked close to the crime boss.

Caitlin walked her fingers across the human's chest. "Thank you. You've been more generous than you could possibly know." She reached into his mind once more with the Force, and whispered to him. "You are going to go home and forget about this encounter."

He stood up and once more spoke in a trance-like voice. "I am going to go home and forget about this encounter." As he left, his bodyguards followed; and two of them made a bet about whether or not he would make it home without passing out, with how drunk he seemed to be acting. Those two preferred to speak in Huttesse.

Jak had a stunned expression on his face as the young woman walked to him victoriously. "How in world did you pull that off?"

"I used to watch a lot of Holovids growing up." She told him, hoping that he would believe that her explanation was the sole source of her ability to obtain his visa, as she held it out to him. "Are we ready to go now?"

"I'd have too much trouble trying to sneak you onto my. Sorry kid?" He told her feeling just a little bad, because she seemed so hopeful; while he hadn't taken their earlier deal seriously. "Without a starport visa, you're stuck here until they lift the lockdown."

She smiled and held out her left hand. With a flick of her wrist, an open starport visa appeared! "Tada! Will this do?"

His jaw nearly hit the floor as he looked at the visa she held out. "How did you get that?" He barely kept himself from yelling the question!

She gave a smug grin. "You'd be surprised where a Hutt wannabe keeps some of his treasures."

"Yeah, I guess I would." Jak laughed as he regained his composure. "We should probably get out of here now. I figure I've been stuck here long enough anyway." He pulled a small cylindrical object from his belt and spoke into the comm. device. "Okay Ten, fire up the engines and get her ready to fly."